Fremantle is making a second attempt at beating the two-match suspension given to Nat Fyfe, making a rare appeal to an AFL tribunal decision.

The hearing, to be held on Thursday evening, will be only the second held by the appeals board this year. The other came after round seven, when it quashed the contentious rough-conduct suspension meted out to Melbourne's Jack Viney.

Fyfe's two-match ban is due to sideline him for the club's last two home-and-away matches. He does not risk missing an additional match if the appeal fails.

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The main tenet of the Dockers' argument at the tribunal, that the high strike should be downgraded from intentional to reckless because Fyfe only intended to strike Hawthorn's Jordan Lewis below his shoulders, was emphatically rejected by tribunal chairman Ross Howie. It was not even put to the tribunal jurors.

An appeal to a tribunal decision can only be launched on any of four grounds: there was an error in law, the verdict was clearly unreasonable based on the evidence, the classification of the offence was "manifestly excessive", the penalty for the offence was "manifestly excessive".

The appeals board comprises chairman Peter O'Callaghan, QC, deputy chairman Brian Collis, QC, along with Brian Bourke, John Schultz, Michael Green and Michael Sexton. Three of the six members will adjudicate on Fyfe's appeal.